Big data may be huge for job creation

The rate at which companies are investing in big data strategies is creating a huge demand for IT experts who can manage the vast amount of content that's being generated every day, since this information can be used to make better business decisions. In fact, these data scientist positions have been named one of the sexiest jobs of the future by Harvard Business Review, as they are expected to be in high demand and will perform extremely valuable work.

Now, researchers at Gartner predict that demand for big data analytics will create 4.4 million IT jobs globally and 1.9 million jobs in the United States alone, according to Peter Sondergaard, senior vice president at Gartner. These individuals can help companies interpret content that's been harnessed, understand how to use data quality tools and interpret the information so marketers, company leaders and supply managers can make better decisions with real-time insight.

"This is a time of accelerating change, where your current IT architecture will be rendered obsolete," Sondergaard said. "You must lead through this change, selectively destroy low impact systems and aggressively change your IT cost structure. This is the new world of the nexus, the next age of computing."